My first car was a golf. If you can DIY it’ll help a lot. Personally they have a reputation that isn’t exactly deserved. I’ve owned German cars and helped maintain Japanese cars. Brakes and oil and such are really a lot cheaper but some of the parts on the Japanese are shockingly expensive in comparison, once you get outside of the “regular maintenance” space.

I have two problems with Toyotas and Hondas. They’re too expensive for their age, and they’re soulless.

I am oversimplifying, but I believe there’s fundamental Philosophical differences between German, American, and Japanese engineering and construction. The Germans build things in a complex manner, often beyond the Pareto Principle. The result is that the thing is marginally superior, but requires regular, scheduled, and often complex and expensive maintenance. The Americans build things with a hammer and duct tape and the thing will work badly much longer than the German product will work. The Japanese build with fine tolerance and simplicity, and assuming not actual abuse and regular maintenance, will outlast them all. But it will be boring. When the business starts cutting costs, they all start to suck.